MBTI: Can Agent 47 be Typed?

If you’ve played any game from the Hitman series, you’re my friend. And since a new movie supposedly based off those games is coming out and it looks like the worst thing since cancer, I want to cover the character for anyone interested and also set the record straight on such an amazing creation that this movie is sure to (further) tarnish.

So what type is the mysterious Agent 47? For me, he appears to be an ISTP at first glance while many may think INTJ. Some would probably throw in INFJ (I wouldn’t) and yet many of his traits bare resemblance to ISTJ. Let’s examine.

If you’re not familiar with the history of Agent 47, quick recap.

Created in a lab cloned from the “Five Fathers,” four notorious figures made up of mob heads, terrorists, and 47’s own creator, Dr. Ort-Meyer, 47 is genetically superior to humans. Though not superhuman himself, he is physically gifted and trained to take care of any situation that might arise. While initially working for the Agency, a clandestine group that operates underground, dispatching anyone for the right price, 47 has rebelled at times when the Agency has shown to be untrustworthy for whatever reason.

There’s much more to 47’s history but no reason to go into every aspect of this nicely detailed character’s history, we’re more interested in his personality. But unlike characters in films, comics, television or literature, 47’s primary medium is video games- making his typing slightly more difficult due to the fact that the choices made in the majority of the game is up to you. Do you go out, guns blazing? Sneak through the entire compound to end your target’s life and let no one else aware of your presence? Or do you go after your target, being just loud enough to attract some attention and dispatch the few others that take notice? There are so many ways to finish one mission in each game, adding to the fun of the character.

So what can we take away as far as 47’s personality goes? As Chris the Ripper put in his comments arguing that 47 is not so easy to type, that since 47 was genetically modified since before his birth, he is a perfect being that may defy typing altogether. While he may be right, we can still pose the question. Here are his most likely candidates.

“Mommy does that man think we can’t see him?”

ISTP-The master of breaking things down and moving forward on a project with limited information and maximum results, the Crafter variant seems like a good fit for 47. Like ISTPs, he shows very little remorse for anyone save for those few he gets to know and even then, this can blow up in their faces; the rabbit he cared for when he was younger, Father Vittorio in Hitman 2: Silent Assassin, Mei Ling. All of these characters dealt with harsh circumstances in part due to their relationship with 47. This trend is a staple with ISTP characters, as well as 47’s free will that shows him rebellious to his superiors when he decides he doesn’t agree with them. ISTP have a tendency to question and dismantle anyone or anything that doesn’t fall in line with their own beliefs, even if it’s just to rile the system.

This is very much like the ISTP Solid Snake (Link above with Chris’ comment) who follows orders until the realization he’s being used like a tool for more malicious purposes.

As a player, our ability to control 47 and use various methods instrumental to the demise of our target also shows a perceiving over judging tendency, as perceivers as shown to improvise much more than their judging counterparts. 47 can use his own weapons, weapons placed by the agency, or any particular tools in the given environment to make his target’s death “accidental.” This, and the ability to blend in all share qualities with the ISTP type, as improvising and chameleon-like attributes are generally displayed by the introverted yet adaptable personality.

INTJ-As an INTJ, planning is most commonly associated with the Mastermind variant, although strategizing is a better term. Creating a strategy and implementing with cold efficiency is a head INTJ trait. In fiction, this is taken to the extreme, as most personalities are. But in particular with the INTJ that is now a calculating and precisely lethal executioner. Being that 47 has his GPS and map of the area giving his exact locations to everything and everyone around him before the mission even begins can just as soon speak to his ability to plan and perform perfectly, as INTJs are capable of.

At times, 47 is shown to have almost precognition of events to take place before they happen. What can be viewed as Se (and the ultimate awareness of surroundings) then becomes a form of Introverted Intuition, where invisible patterns are seen and the INTJs inferior Se can be harnessed to act on said patterns. This of course, would be the INTJ’s functions fully realized of course, but whatever type 47 is, they would have to be, as 47 is physically perfect and mentally superior, as he was created and trained to be.

47 is also shown to be blunt and flat-out rude in certain social interactions, at times, nearly giving away his cover when “socializing” with bystanders unknowingly vital to his operation; just as desk clerks and local body guards, making them suspicious of 47’s activity. While INTJs can deal with people well enough, there is a certain coldness and often rudeness to their disposition, leaving those around them with the idea that something is “not quite right” with this Rational type.

ISTJ-The Inspector variant often gets shunned in their fictional typings, with so many characters being lent out to Intuitive types, regardless of how clearly they show sensing functions. The ISTJ is a great example of how “practice makes perfect” and that types often mistaken as INTJ are actually ISTJ. Is this the case with 47? Being born and raised in a lab to be the ultimate stealth weapon could very well be the reason 47’s coldness as Si/Te often makes for a type that doesn’t care about your day or what movies are playing and would much rather be left to their own repetitive devices. Whatever Si is repeatedly exposed to is what becomes their normality and 47 was raised to discreetly murder without being caught. And that’s exactly what his life consists of. When he breaks free from his superiors, he still ends up back in the same world he was created.

Another interesting note on ISTJs is that if they’re model of authority is shown to be false or untrustworthy, they will completely disavow it and all aspects associated with it, such as what 47 has done by the end of Codename: 47 and the beginning of Silent Assassin, as he works as the groundskeeper for Father Vittorio and the church, until Vittorio is kidnapped and used as a way to get 47 back in the game…the assassin game.

Seeing as how maps, contacts, and weapons are laid out all around the environment and 47 has been training nonstop from the time he was old enough to handle a weapon, 47’s Si would be honed to a fine point if you can accept the vernacular. All ISTJs need is practice and reliable training methods no matter how varied and the ISTJ can perform flawlessly.

So what is he?

Being genetically modified really does put a weird twist on things and having the player in control of the character with a uniquely varied environment makes things all the more complicated. With a character like Solid Snake in the MGS games, there are very specific goals and dialogue between him and other characters to let us know he’s ISTP.

With 47, he’s given a lot of room to work with while his character is specifically meant to hold back and remain withdrawn. So Introversion and Thinking over feeling are definite.

But the major issue that sticks out is that if 47 works at maximum mental capacity, can he be typed at all? What functions would anyone prefer if they’re a perfect human being, minus the empathy, which 47 has shown at times.

Ultimately, I still think 47 is best fit by ISTP though I don’t hold the opinion so strongly that I would make a fully fledged post on it since I think the others are likely candidates as well and there aren’t many other characters like him. Combined from a few humans, modified to perfection and programmed to be a living murder machine.

Yet at the same time, there are the other clones created, usually with the purpose of stopping 47. The Agent 48 is physically superior to 47 but are more controllable than him as well. So they’re more like terminators than actual people. This would suggest that 47’s will is something to be tampered with, if by no one other than himself. He also is able to use factors in his environment to improvise with to get his job done, while both INTJ and ISTJ would generally be much more likely to stick to a more precise schedule. This, again, points more in the direction of ISTP.

With no offense to any one person directly, I’m all for boycotting the 2015 movie coming up, personally. Casting Paul Walker originally was bad enough, but after the trailers that have been released show that these people don’t know what they’re doing. 47 is not a character to be caught in the middle of a busy urban intersection and spin around with his twin .45s blasting at SWAT teams repelling from helicopters or whatever is going on. Not to mention that interrogation scene looks like something a kid would have come up with, having no clue how the police, guns, and physics actually work.

The character is such that if he chooses to kill surrounding witnesses or enemies, he does so in a way that nobody ever sees or hears coming. Not this shoot’em up style cops-and-robbers crap.

They went from something akin to Leon the Professional and turned it into Fast and Furious. 47 wines and dines you, this movie is like the perv in the parking lot of a mall, whipping his trench coat open to expose himself. Screw those guys, man.

Yup, I have no doubts on your attempt at closure now. IxTJ’s wouldn’t act like him, his bluntness gives off an impression of a Ti-Fe axis and not a directive-like Te-Fi axis. ISTP may have trouble trusting Te systems, since their Ti dominance, but for a genetically modified and conditioned clones like 47, those Te systems are the original environment. So in this light, after the betrayals he has no trouble developing his own morals, showing again a great ability to adapt to circumstances, denoting a P preference.
I would say now he is an ISTP with highly developed Ti, Se and Ni. Fe still seems to be quite repressed, maybe it is developed as well, but the routine and trainings and the fact that he is a male, makes it harder to rely on Fe, so he can not really train it in the environment. It is still somewhere out there and pops up at interesting times, when his major Ti intersects with Fe to save someone entangled in his Ti values. Agent 47 is the perfect fictional ISTP. (except when incompetent people take his role in the game, I am pretty sure there is a cutscene no one sees where Agent 47 facepalms)